Field
The present invention relates to mobile networks, and more particularly to systems, methods, and computer program products for managing data re-installation including service re-installation.
Related Art
A service provider (SP) is a company, organization, entity, or the like, that provides services to customers or consumers. Examples of service providers include account-issuing entities such as merchants, card associations, banks, marketing companies, and transit authorities. A service may be an activity, capability, functionality, work, or use that is permitted or provided by a service provider such as a payment service, a ticketing service, a gift, offer or loyalty service, a transit pass service, and the like. A service may include one or more applets as well as data (e.g., credentials) associated with each of the applets.
In a mobile environment that involves contactless transactions between a mobile device and a service provider, information relating to the accounts and applets issued by the service providers is downloaded onto mobile devices in order to enable them to perform the contactless transactions.
A trusted service manager (TSM) is typically an independent entity serving mobile network operators (MNOs) and account-issuing service providers by provisioning applets, such as contactless applets associated with the service providers, to mobile devices. Typical TSMs can distribute and manage the contactless applets remotely because they have access to secure elements (SEs) in a near field communication (NFC) enabled mobile device.
Security-critical applets, such as those involving payment and account credentials, require secure hardware storage and a secure execution environment. On mobile devices, this is usually handled by the secure element.
The secure element is a platform onto which applets can be installed, personalized and managed. It consists of hardware, software, interfaces, and protocols that enable the secure storage of data such as credentials, and execution of applets for payment, authentication, and other services. An applet may correspond to a service (e.g., payment, commerce, ticketing) offered by a service provider.
A secure element may be implemented in different form factors such as a Universal Integrated Circuit Card (UICC), an embedded secure element, or NFC enablers such as a separate chip or secure device, which can be inserted into a slot on the mobile device. Typically a UICC is in the form of a subscriber identity module (SIM), which is controlled by the MNOs. An embedded secure element gives service providers the option to embed the secure element into the phone itself. One way in which secure element form factors are implemented is defined in, for example, GlobalPlatform Card Specification Versions 2.1.1, 2.2, and 2.2.1 (hereinafter “Global Platform”).
A secure element may include one or more security domains (SDs), each of which includes a collection of data, such as packages, applets, and the like, that trust a common entity (e.g., are authenticated or managed by using a common security key or token).
Security domains may be associated with service providers and may include service provider applets such as loyalty, couponing, and credit card, and transit applets.
A central TSM is a system for interfacing (e.g., communicating, beginning a dialog) service providers and secure elements, for example for service providers to personalize services on a secure element, transmit scripts to be processed, and the like. An exemplary embodiment of a central TSM for managing communications between service providers and secure elements is described in more detail in U.S. patent application Ser. No. 13/653,160 entitled “Systems, Methods, and Computer Program Products for Interfacing Multiple Service Provider Trusted Service Managers and Secure Elements,” which is hereby incorporated by reference in its entirety.
Traditionally, when a SP attempts to personalize a service on a secure element, and during that personalization the procedure fails (e.g., due to a communication error or a dropped connection), the SP would have to manage and execute multiple new individual processes outside of that initial personalization procedure to, for example, clean up (e.g., delete) the partially personalized service and perform a recovery attempt to personalize the service. That is, traditionally the SP executes several steps that require intervention of the SP's middleware and the end-user or customer of the service to repair the personalization procedure failure. This is a time consuming and complex procedure, which requires extensive processing, coordinating, and use of resources.
One technical challenge involves centralizing a procedure within a TSM to re-install a partially personalized service without the intervention of the middleware of a SP.
Another technical challenge involves re-installing a service in accordance with requirements of the service (e.g., a service having security-critical data).